August 27, 2012 AT 3:23 pm

RiderCool – an Arduino/Adafruit Pool Management System

One of Adafruit’s favorite makers, Kristopher, has another absolutely amazing project to share with us.

RiderCool has many purposes:

1. Provide a technology platform for managing the pool with native XBee Network Protocol (XNP) support for sending data back for logging and to receive commands from a control router.
2. To measure how full our pool is, and report that data back to my computer using my XBee Network Protocol (XNP) for logging and tracking (http://sojournstudio.org/xnp/)
3. To activate a solenoid/valve that is connected to a garden hose, which will fill the pool with water.
4. To monitor, track and report-back the flow-rate of water going into the pool using an Adafruit flow-meter sensor (https://www.adafruit.com/products/828).
5. To monitor the temperature of the pool water, the ambient air, as well as ther CPU temp (https://www.adafruit.com/products/339), (https://www.adafruit.com/products/372)
6. To monitor a backup water-level sensor to ensure that the pool never over-flows.
7. To drive/control 4 RGB LED Strip controllers by Jeremy Saglimbeni; I have 40 meters of LED RGB Strip ringing-the pool. (http://thecustomgeek.com/2012/03/23/rgb … r-ver-2-2/)
8. To displays the output of these sensors, LED status, etc on an Adafruit 1.8′ TFT display for swimmers in the pool to see. (https://www.adafruit.com/products/358)
9. To provide button control resetting the system and controlling the RGB LED Strips using LED water-proof lights by Adafruit. (https://www.adafruit.com/products/482)
10. To teach me 3D printing – as this is my first 3D printing project with my MakerBot Replicator! (http://store.makerbot.com/replicator.html).
…
RiderCool was only possible because of the excellent products, tutorials and service that +Limor Fried and her company Adafruit Industries provides to its customers, and I have become a dedicated fan over the 1.5 years I’ve been making. With this project I got to learn 3D printing and got some real use out of my years in Blender training. I also got to combine different products in a completely water-proof system. Now that it’s done, of course, the summer is over and its nearly time to close the pool down. But building this helped me through alot of dark days this summer.

"When you make a thing, a thing that is new, it is so complicated making it that it is bound to be ugly. But those that make it after you, they don’t have to worry about making it. And they can make it pretty, and so everybody can like it when others make it after you" - Pablo Picasso